It was before the sunset that I turned
From where the late day burned,
And climbed the wide brown pasture-lands that run
Along the hillside; there the warm weeds purr
For comfort of the sun.
Some secret in their look
Led me until, struck through with love and awe,
I saw
My Brook. ...
Glad hastener!
Though the high-tide of clover was astir,
And blue-eyed flowers leaned across the grass
To see it pass,
And the long-tangled tresses
Of water-cresses
Were misted with thin crystal understream, —
For more content
To small suspected presences, agleam
And then away! — yet ever diligent,
Untamed, soft-fluttering,
The little creature went on rapturous wing,
Loyal and changeful, feathered, yet at rest,
On its own quest,
Subtle as light and simple as a nest.
It mused among the shaggy weeds and bubbled
In broken paths, untroubled;
With such a tongue to comfort and beseech,
It won the stones to speech.
Long time I listened, pondered, with love-looks,
The ways of brooks;
When, feeling, half-aware,
The benediction-touch upon my hair
Of something fair,
I turned from that wise water happy-voiced;
And there,
Against the flush of waning afternoon,
Early, a dim moth-silver, poised